The biggest problem of the third industrial revolution is as easy to explain as it is difficult to solve. Technology is creating a global economy that is rapidly supplanting our old national economies. National governments cannot control this new economy, yet no one, least of all Americans, wants to create the form of global government that might be able to control it. As a result we were going to be living in a fundamentally unmanaged economic system. The difficulties of containing the 1997 Asian economic meltdown are just the first of many such difficulties we can expect.

　　National governments, which used to worry about managing and maintaining their economic systems, are slowly being pushed out of business. Changes in global finance overwhelm all but the largest governments. Governments have lost much of their influence over the movement of information and capital. They cannot control who crosses their borders either physically or culturally.

　　Conversely, the power of global businesses is growing with companies' ability to move to the most advantageous locations and play countries off against one another in bidding for attractive investment projects.

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　　要理解第三次工业革命中出现的最严峻的问题并非难事，可是要解决它却十分困难。技术革命形成经济全球化，这一模式正在迅速取代旧有的民族经济。虽然各国政府在控制这一新的经济形式上力不从心，然而，没有哪个国家愿意携起手来，合力对付它，美国就更不用说了。结果我们只好生活在这种失控的经济中。1997年的亚洲金融风暴是我们遇到的第一个困境。今后我们还会有更多的麻烦。各国政府向来为管理和维持国内的经济体制而煞费苦心，现在它们正渐渐地被淘汰出局。全球金融领域的变革使它们束手无策，只有几个大国的政府未受冲击。各国政府已无法干预信息和资本的流动，无法制约别国在资金和文化上的渗透。相反，跨国企业的力量不断壮大，各大公司纷纷进入那些最有利可图的地域，并且使得各国为了吸引外资而激烈竞争，从而进一步扩大了经济全球化的影响。